How Union Organizers Will Continue Their Fight With Amazon (deccanherald.com) 185
"The lopsided vote against a union at Amazon's warehouse in Bessemer, Alabama, was a major disappointment to organized labor..." writes the New York Times. "Yet the defeat doesn't mark the end of the campaign against Amazon so much as a shift in strategy."
The article notes unions and other labor groups enjoyed more success when opposing Amazon's plans for a New York headquarters by joining with local politicians and nonprofit organizations: In interviews, labor leaders said they would step up their informal efforts to highlight and resist the company's business and labor practices rather than seek elections at individual job sites, as in Bessemer. The approach includes everything from walkouts and protests to public relations campaigns that draw attention to Amazon's leverage over its customers and competitors...
The strategy reflects a paradox of the labor movement: While the Gallup Poll has found that roughly two-thirds of Americans approve of unions — up from half in 2009, a low point — it has rarely been more difficult to unionize a large company. One reason is that labor law gives employers sizable advantages. The law typically forces workers to win elections at individual work sites of a company like Amazon, which would mean hundreds of separate campaigns. It allows employers to campaign aggressively against unions and does little to punish employers that threaten or retaliate against workers who try to organize. Lawyers representing management say that union membership has declined — from about one-third of private-sector workers in the 1950s to just over 6 percent today — because employers have gotten better at addressing workers' needs... But labor leaders say wealthy, powerful companies have grown much bolder in pressing the advantages that labor law affords them....
[E]ven as elections have often proven futile, labor has enjoyed some success over the years with an alternative model — what Dr. Ruth Milkman, a sociologist of labor at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, called the "air war plus ground war." The idea is to combine workplace actions like walkouts (the ground war) with pressure on company executives through public relations campaigns that highlight labor conditions and enlist the support of public figures (the air war). The Service Employees International Union used the strategy to organize janitors beginning in the 1980s, and to win gains for fast-food workers in the past few years, including wage increases across the industry. "There are almost never any elections," Dr. Milkman said. "It's all about putting pressure on decision makers at the top...."
Many labor officials urged Congress to increase its scrutiny of Amazon's labor practices, including its use of mandatory meetings, texts and signs to discourage workers in Alabama from unionizing...But after Bessemer, many labor leaders think Congress should go further, letting workers unionize companywide or industrywide, not just by work site as is typical... Mary Kay Henry, president of the Service Employees International Union, agreed that the key to taking on a company as powerful as Amazon was to make it easier for workers to unionize across a company or industry. "It's not going to happen one warehouse at a time," she said.
But Ms. Henry said workers and politicians could pressure Amazon to come to the bargaining table long before the law formally requires it.
The article notes unions and other labor groups enjoyed more success when opposing Amazon's plans for a New York headquarters by joining with local politicians and nonprofit organizations: In interviews, labor leaders said they would step up their informal efforts to highlight and resist the company's business and labor practices rather than seek elections at individual job sites, as in Bessemer. The approach includes everything from walkouts and protests to public relations campaigns that draw attention to Amazon's leverage over its customers and competitors...
The strategy reflects a paradox of the labor movement: While the Gallup Poll has found that roughly two-thirds of Americans approve of unions — up from half in 2009, a low point — it has rarely been more difficult to unionize a large company. One reason is that labor law gives employers sizable advantages. The law typically forces workers to win elections at individual work sites of a company like Amazon, which would mean hundreds of separate campaigns. It allows employers to campaign aggressively against unions and does little to punish employers that threaten or retaliate against workers who try to organize. Lawyers representing management say that union membership has declined — from about one-third of private-sector workers in the 1950s to just over 6 percent today — because employers have gotten better at addressing workers' needs... But labor leaders say wealthy, powerful companies have grown much bolder in pressing the advantages that labor law affords them....
[E]ven as elections have often proven futile, labor has enjoyed some success over the years with an alternative model — what Dr. Ruth Milkman, a sociologist of labor at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, called the "air war plus ground war." The idea is to combine workplace actions like walkouts (the ground war) with pressure on company executives through public relations campaigns that highlight labor conditions and enlist the support of public figures (the air war). The Service Employees International Union used the strategy to organize janitors beginning in the 1980s, and to win gains for fast-food workers in the past few years, including wage increases across the industry. "There are almost never any elections," Dr. Milkman said. "It's all about putting pressure on decision makers at the top...."
Many labor officials urged Congress to increase its scrutiny of Amazon's labor practices, including its use of mandatory meetings, texts and signs to discourage workers in Alabama from unionizing...But after Bessemer, many labor leaders think Congress should go further, letting workers unionize companywide or industrywide, not just by work site as is typical... Mary Kay Henry, president of the Service Employees International Union, agreed that the key to taking on a company as powerful as Amazon was to make it easier for workers to unionize across a company or industry. "It's not going to happen one warehouse at a time," she said.
But Ms. Henry said workers and politicians could pressure Amazon to come to the bargaining table long before the law formally requires it.
Raises the question (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
In recent times whenever I give my money to a McDonalds (not that often) Walmart (almost never) or Amazon (less and less), the question arises why would I want to spend my money someplace where I would never (please God!) want to work.
Because price is a major decision factor when making a purchase and since labor is a component of price, companies with more expensive labor have higher costing products (or services). While for some people the behavior or ethics of the underlying company is a more important factor than the product price, for enough (most?) people price is *the* factor. This does assume that products or services from different companies have similar quality, but even to an extent for a lot of people, price is even more impo
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Would you want to drive a taxi? Pump septic tanks? Pick fruit? There are all kinds of jobs we would not want to do, but that are necessary parts of our society. I have done enough shit jobs early in life to appreciate the fact that others do the work and I respect them for it. Specific to Amazon, their endgame is likely to automate away 70-90% of the fulfillment center jobs anyway. I am not sure that the individuals would really get excited about changes that would make that happen faster.
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Amazon will automate when it is cheaper to do so. Unions increase their cost exposure which pushes investement into automation. Without unionization, the automation pace will be much slower. It is actually good on a number of levels to employ a lot of people— until they can’t keep up with your needs.
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why would I want to spend my money someplace where I would never (please God!) want to work.
Isn't this what the whole concept of specialization is about? People find some thing they can do/they're good at, do that thing, get money for their work, than use the money to obtain goods and services they can't themselves make, or don't like to. For example, I'm a terrible cook, and I couldn't ever get hired to work in a kitchen. Does it mean I shouldn't ever give money to restaurants? Would this make life better for the restaurant workers?
Specialization has built civilization. Without it, humanity could
Re:Raises the question (Score:4, Interesting)
the question arises why would I want to spend my money someplace where I would never (please God!) want to work.
That's quite a silly argument. Why would you spend money on council fees if you don't want to work in garbage collection? Why would you want to buy a cow if you don't want to work in an abattoir. I guarantee you that basically *everywhere* I spend money is not a place I want to work in some form or another. You can find shitty jobs you don't want at every employer. At the same time the way Amazon treats its warehouse workers has precisely nothing to do with the way it would treat researchers in their (from what I've heard) very very well funded R&D departments.
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That's quite a silly argument. Why would you spend money on council fees if you don't want to work in garbage collection?
Eh?
The OP wouldn't want to work ANYWHERE i Amazon because it's a garbage place which makes life miserable for it's employees. There are plenty of jobs I wouldn't want to do in places I'd be happy to work at, but the existence of those jobs doesn't mean I wouldn't want to work at the organisation.
The council does plenty of stuff.
At the same time the way Amazon treats its warehouse workers
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they quit giving warehouse staff shares actually, i believe that was one of the issues they wanted adressed.
It's all about the votes (Score:5, Insightful)
If you want to fully support the right of workers to form a union, you have to support their right not to form a union. Otherwise you're really not in favor of the workers' agency in the matter at all -- it's just a fig leaf for your preferred policy.
I would totally support those workers if they had chosen to unionize, but they didn't and we ought to respect that choice. Running around and blaming everything else when you lose an election is not a good look and the public knows that. Just fess up your loss, say you gave it a shot and move on to the next battle.
Re:It's all about the votes (Score:5, Insightful)
If you want to fully support the right of workers to form a union, you have to support their right not to form a union.
While I do agree, I doubt anyone in this case honestly didn't want to form a union. It seems more the case that they were afraid that they would all lose their jobs if they did form a union. Amazon has all the resources they need to survive closing down a single warehouse and opening somewhere else. Also, they have the resources to weather a protracted legal battle which they might be capable of winning with a "we were planning to close this warehouse anyway" plan they have stashed away.
What they should be doing is getting many warehouses to all vote on the same day. This way, not only would the injury inflicted by closing many warehouses be significant but it would also make it unmistakably clear that closing all the warehouses involved is retaliation, which is a legally dire position. You can't shut them all down because it's retaliation and you can't shut some down without incurring the wrath of the rest of the union.
Fear (Score:3)
The first thing that came to my mind, when gauging these people's fear, is that the 'zon is somewhere along the route to panopticon status, and many of them buy into the belief that they "have" to spend their money at the company store. Yes, they're even there with you in the shitter, anti-union posters on the stall door, plus they're in your phone.
Are they mistaken that they have to use the company store? Yes. But that doesn't change their belief. Most people on Slashdot who dislike the company still spend
Re:It's all about the votes (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't think that Amazon shenanigans can explain a 2:1 vote against the union. That's a much larger margin than even Reagan beat Mondale (60/40) which itself was considered an insane blowout.
If it was decided by just a few percentage points in either direction, you might look closer at whether there was anything amiss. When it's a full 30+ point margin, that just sounds like crazy talk.
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I was rather surprised that they didn't vote to unionize; I would have bet real money that they would have done so overwhelmingly.
I don't think Amazon tampered with the vote count. In the end, the workers just didn't want to unionize.
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The union was trying to organize 1500-1600 people and was confident they had a majority. Amazon fought to have a large number of other employees included, a group that the union hadn't worked to organize and wouldn't have as much of a stake in unionization. Considering how the numbers shook out, that would seem to explain a lot of it.
https://nymag.com/intelligence... [nymag.com]
Also bear in mind that there's a lot of anti-union propaganda just floating around in society. People don't really learn bout them in schools a
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I think it's pretty obvious that, no, Amazon did not do the right thing here, they tried to include as many people that they thought would not give them the vote as possible.
In the long run, sure, unionizing all workers is a better deal, but I can understand why temporary workers might not be invested.
I disagree (Score:3)
Re:Jan 6 (Score:4, Informative)
When Trump lost an election his supporters invaded the Capitol. Now the Unions have lost an election. We will see if they behave any better.
That’s setting the bar really low...
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Basically, yes.
Time to spend some karma (Score:3, Insightful)
Look, I can sit here for 20 minutes rattling off why Trump was a bad idea made worse in execution. How everything he touched was a failure ending in bankruptcy. How he only had wealth because of his father. How his dad made his money as a slum lord and his grand dad in prostitution. How he played the character of a billionaire on TV without being one (proved in court, look it up, he sued a
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A large number of people, including several here on /., are now openly opposed to Democracy as a system of government
Who, exactly?
Bear in mind, the media, and it seems you as well, can't tell when they're being trolled. That whole ok sign being a hate sign for example...That's a 4chan meme. Pepe the frog...4chan. These are people whose only goal is to make you outraged, and they'll say whatever they can towards that end. The whole point is to induce a moral panic, which let's be honest, moral panics are fucking hilarious [imgur.com]. Especially when they happen on Oprah [youtube.com] (because it's probably not obvious to you, that was a 4chan meme
Well, the 74 million people not calling (Score:2)
And, well, again, there's google [google.com] searches [pewresearch.org]
But of, "It can't happen here", right?
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You specifically said this:
A large number of people, including several here on /., are now openly opposed to Democracy as a system of government
That is way, way, way different from this:
saying ‘everything possible’ should be done to make voting easy declines
So either you're A) incredibly stupid, B) being deliberately deceptive with that statement C) you flat out made that up (that is, you lied), or D) you can't tell when you're being trolled (see also, A.)
Something else I should have mentioned (Score:2, Interesting)
In all cases nothing was done against the people attacking the government buildings. So far nothing much has been done to the Jan 6th people (likely because of Jury Nullification and Biden hoping to use plea deals to break up literal terrorist cells that have formed the last 4 years due to lax law enfor
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
"The problem is what Trump support says about you as a voter. And how those .0002% are indicative of a large issue."
And that's why I've backed away from the few acquaintances of mine who were (are) Trumpers. Most of them are, superficially, nice people.
But the fact is that there are "nice people" who support all sorts of dreadfully shitty people, parties, and programs. Which means that in reality, after peeling back a layer or two, they're not nice people after all.
The fact is that Trump supporters like the
I know some "shirt off their back" guys (Score:2)
People in the "out" group though better get out of their way.
I don't even know what to do with folks like that. It's a kind of double think. They're often racist but only in the abstract. They've never met a black or latino person they didn't like but they're convinced there's these "welfare queens" out there holding them and thei
Not all the Trump supporters are in it (Score:2)
The racists we can deal with by combating racism. The ones with economic anxiety looking for an outsider who'll help them we can take care of by fixing the economy.
There's a 3rd class that nobody outside of academics and the left are talking about: Fascists.
I don't mean this as an insult either. I'm not using "Fascist" as a stand in for authoritarian either. What I'm talking about are actual Fascists. e.g. people who want
br> 1. Hyper Nati
Then explain those 253 laws (Score:2, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Unfortunately it's not bullshit.
It's what the Republican party is metastasizing into and the infection is well underway.
For reference, see: Lauren Boebert, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Madison Cawthorn, and Matt Gaetz. And those are just the ones that come to mind right away.
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They are really excellent at playing the really long game. Judicial appointments, gerrymandering, changes in campaign finance reform, etc. This stuff is doing a lot of damage over a really long time. And the alternative is a party that claims they might give the people what they want, but also don't want to upset rich/corporate donors. There's not really any check on it.
Value for money (Score:2)
Until workers believe that the money they have to pay is les of burden than there allegedly horrible working conditions, no one is going to vote for a union. This is what happened in Alabama. Those of us
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I've also heard the argument from the employer side that goes something like, "Oh, we care about you and your well-being so much. We love having open and honest discussions with each and every one of you. If you run off and join the union, we won't be able to talk freely anymore. Wouldn't that be awful?"
I think that's a total BS argument. Keep things equitable by driving just enough of a wedge between labor and management...employers use that "happy family" thing to walk all over people, not give them raise
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
The company I work for has had talk of unionization, but it was defeated by "we are family and a union would not allow us the flexibility that we have now" and the fact that the companies actions DO reflect that.
A coworker got cancer and fought it for years and they made sure he still had his paycheck every week.
They specifically got a long term disability plan for employees that covered him being able to work 2-3 days a week.
They have covered almost all of the price increases in our healthcare plan premium
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"Back in the day unions were important for worker safety..."
Have you been asleep since March 2020?
Employers hold all the cards. (Score:3)
Re:Employers hold all the cards. (Score:4, Insightful)
That's in in a nutshell. I'll bet the biggest rumor floating around that warehouse was that a vote for unionization was a vote to shut down the site.
We have 50 years of anti-union and anti-worker legislation and a whole lot of anti-union propaganda working against us. Hell, you still have guys ranting about Jimmy Hoffa and teamsters in bars around the country.
My dad was a union man. My mother used to tell us that the only bill she liked to pay was our family's union dues. She knew what that union had done for us, and how much protection it had offered us over the years. (A living paradox. They always voted republican, and often complained about organized labor. But dad's union was sacred.)
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This is the story that has to come out, but employers hold too many of the cards now. People who say they can negotiate an amazing deal on their own aren't the wheeler-dealers they think they are. Even highly skilled labor faces the threat of offshoring.
I've never worked in a union environment, but I know how much goof they've done for the average worker over the years. The problem is that people are fed a constant diet of anti-union propaganda -- telling them that if they just work harder they can be just
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So it has nothing to do with the fact that those warehouse jobs already have above average wage and benefits for the area? What value would the union add to what matters most to those workers - their paycheck? Or that residents in a deep red state might not see having part of their paycheck siphoned off to an organization that overwhelmingly pours money in to political causes they don't personally believe in as being a benefit to them?
I'm seeing so much shock from the left. The disbelief that workers som
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I kind of value not having to piss into the trash at my workplace. Money is a lot of it, but it's also not everything.
I can't speak for everywhere, but in my state, it's illegal to use union dues for political purposes. Employees have to specifically opt in (which they'd be smart to do, as the working conditions for public sector employment are pretty obviously influenced by politics).
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It's not, actually! This account does its best to track all union elections. Their numbers are 72% wins. It's a lot of small places you'd never hear about though.
https://twitter.com/UnionElect... [twitter.com]
This is not an exact science, but I'm really impressed that it happens so often.
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Isn't that good thing? It puts workers and employers on equal footing. Relationships tend to be better for both parties when one isn't advantaged over the other.
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Yes, it's 100% a good thing. It's the only way you get pushback against a much more powerful force. I would much rather work in an environment where labor and management are at least honest with each other that they're working toward different goals. It's better than pretending they're all on the same team. Even if I were in management, I'd be happier knowing that there were only certain levers I could pull with the workforce...it'd make the hard task of managing humans easier.
Re:Employers hold all the cards. (Score:4, Insightful)
"Often, unions do not look out for the health of the company."
Maybe so, but "the health of the company" would be a lot healthier if the executives weren't getting paid 300 times what the average worker is getting. A unionized workforce would force companies to share at least some of their profits with employees in the form of better wages or conditions. I think that's what modern unions need to push back against more than anything...the main reason everything is so lopsided economically today is because we've internalized the idea that CEOs deserve $100M salaries and god-like treatment, and that the workers just have to sit back and deal with it.
"Companies know they need to keep employees happy."
Skilled or unskilled, I have never worked in an environment where the company cared whether I was happy. Outside of magical chocolate factory FAANG employers with insane profit margins, I can't think of a place that says "let's prioritize raises/benefits/better working conditions over a bonus for us!" At least with the cold war/mutually assured destruction scenario in place, both sides have to at least come to a compromise.
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Outside of magical chocolate factory FAANG employers with insane profit margins, I can't think of a place that says "let's prioritize raises/benefits/better working conditions over a bonus for us!"
Not every company is obsessed with quarterly profits over all else. Retention of high performing employees is important to the long term profits of a company.
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GM's CEO made $14.9M in 2008. It's $21.6M today. Their compensation went up 64% in 2007. 6.4% would be an incredible jump in my own salary.
Seems they had some amount of money to work with.
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At my employer, we can't trust the employer to tell the truth about the health of the company. I work for a University, and they have $600M in unrestricted reserves, and managed to sock away more while the pandemic was going on. Meanwhile, they laid off 1000 people and claim to have a financial emergency. They're still paying a football coach $4M a year, and paying a past president a sabbatical of ~$750k, as well as receiving lots of pandemic aid. There are stories like this around the country. Do they have
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Something that is often left out of this conversation is that Republicans often simply fail to fill positions on the NLRB, or the companion state agency, or fill them with anti-worker corporate types or incompetents. I don't believe the Public Employment Relations Commission in NJ was fully staffed the entire time Chris Christie was in office, and these are the people you have to deal with when you have a labor violation. Laws are great until you have no avenue for enforcement, and as someone who's had to s
Amazon has all the power (Score:4, Interesting)
I predict that if ever by some miracle an Amazon facility is unionized, Amazon will simply close it and fire all the workers.
Wal-Mart did exactly that [www.cbc.ca] in Canada.
Amazon knows it has to have a scorched-earth policy against unionization in order to squeeze the most profit possible out of its operations. It has to keep working conditions bad to make as much profit as it can. The employees in Alabama probably knew full well that they'd be out of work within 6 months if they'd voted to unionize.
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We need legislation that protects workers who unionize or want to unionize.
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The trouble with this legislation is it also needs to take into account efficiency of the result. A company I worked for did precisely what the GP described: Shutdown and closed the only site which voted to unionise. Mind you that site went from a middle of the barrel performer to a money loser, and I'll be damned if I'd support legislation that forces a company to make a loss in the name of protecting a union.
Be very careful *how* you propose protection.
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If a business model cannot succeed unless it imposes bad working conditions on workers, then... does it really deserve to succeed?
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Who said there were bad working conditions? You assume that every union must be fighting "the man". Absolutely not so. The site in question already had maintenance and operational staff who were wildly overpaid and about the most relaxed guys on the planet. Hell when they went to employ a new operator they had some 500 applicants for a single position. It was one of the most sought after jobs in the city.
It's much harder for Amazon (Score:2)
That said, with JIT they could close a center and reopen another in no time, and because the economy is always getting worse (since we refuse to do what needs to be done to stabilize and grow it) they can count on a ton of desperate workers. So it's still a risk.
What's needed is laws, but we can't get those on the local level without Federal help. That's because it's too easy t
When I saw the comment that unions (Score:2)
what is a "lopsided vote"? (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
The union lost the vote by a 2-to-1 margin. That's about as lopsided as it gets.
The union never had a chance of winning, but you wouldn't know that from the also totally lopsided coverage given to this story the past several months.
i vote for the union (Score:2, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
And yet tens of thousands of people gladly work those "Slavery 2.0" jobs when they're free to quit at any time. Perhaps "what you've heard" might be agenda-driven BS by a corrupt media?
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They why don't you like unions?
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i dont like unions either but at least somebody is stepping up to level the playing field and will at least force some better working conditions and better pay for the employees
But that's literally the job of unions.
They're going to have to get new laws (Score:2)
It's going to be hard though. The Republicans, who are very anti-Union, have 253 new laws to make it harder to vote against them in elections around the country. The Democrats, who are quintessential milquetoasts, are letting them. They need to kill the filibuster and pass a new Voting Rights Act but they've got 2 people (Joe Manchin
Can you sue a company for not allowing a union... (Score:2)
For example, let's say that that some company X leases space to other businesses, but is for whatever reason predisposed towards not leasing space to businesses that have unionized employees... so if it were leasing space to company Y where there was talk of forming a union, so X informs Y (with suitable notice) that their lease is going to be terminated unless they stop the union, X is not di
Why does the union even need a vote? (Score:2)
Why can't the employees who want to join a union just join a union?
I haven't looked into the specific terms of this Amazon union vote, but I assume the purpose of the vote was to force everyone who voted "no" to join the union against their wishes. And since the "no" votes exceeded the "yes" votes the union is now looking for other ways to force people to join.
I have nothing against unions as long as they don't have the right to take away jobs. If a company offers me a job and I like the terms of the offer
Success? (Score:4, Insightful)
A success for the union. Not so good for the workers who would have benefited from the jobs that office would have brought to the area.
Workers overwhelmingly rejected the unionization (Score:2, Insightful)
but the union organizers don't believe in democracy and are looking for other ways to force unions on the workers.
ignore the votes (Score:2)
In interviews, labor leaders said they would step up their informal efforts to highlight and resist the company's business and labor practices rather than seek elections at individual job sites
or in other words democracy doesn't get us what we want so we will ignore the will of the voter.
Unions fought for the benefits you enjoy NOW (Score:2, Funny)
I'm wondering how many in this thread actually BELONG to a union or work at a place that has a union? I'm guessing very little. People who work in the private sector ENJOY the many benefits that UNIONS have fought for decades. Do they really think they're just GIVEN these BENEFITS? They're foolish to think that an employer WANTS to give you paid vacations, sick leave, health benefits, 8 hour work days, holidays, etc... The list goes on and on. If you'd like to know what a work place would be like if i
Re: (Score:2)
I'm a union president. It's not common in the tech field though. Have been attending a DevOps conference over the past couple of years though where there's always a labor open space. Seems tech workers are getting tired of being exploited too, though it's funny that many of them really really don't want to call themselves interested in a union, but then describe wanting to form an organization that does all the same things. The anti-union propaganda runs deep, I guess? Maybe it's just savvy to avoid the sti
Re: Hahahaha (Score:2, Insightful)
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Really? Can you point to me the California law that requires union membership? I work in California and I've never heard of such a thing.
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So between corporate thugs and union thugs, California chose not to take sides. Because why should they? Is one really better than the other?
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Wrong again! [mccarter.com]
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I think he's referring to non-right-to-work states. In states like California, you can be forced to join a union in order to work at a particular company. This also means you have to follow the union's rules and pay dues to the union. If you ever refuse to do one of those, or just decide to leave the union, then by law the union can force your employer to fire you.
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What does the union do for its members in exchange for paying union dues and following union rules? Overall, is it a good deal for the members or a bad deal?
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Good unions organize workers to work collectively towards goals related to improving the workplace. Better salary, better safety measures, better opportunity for advancement... whatever. That's basically it. It's a lot of effort though, and some are not so good/filled with people in leadership who are burned out/have the wrong philosophy about what results in actual gains at the workplace/think making shitty deals with management are the best they can do.
Most unions are, at least on paper, democratic, and i
Re: (Score:2)
Because they were up against one of the largest companies in the world with almost unlimited resources? Is this hard for you to understand?
Not Quite... (Score:5, Insightful)
But the thing is that because this was attempted in a single location, it made it much, much easier for the employer to work to undermine any efforts that the union may have made in attracting membership. TFA discusses mandatory meetings, posters, text messages - an incessant marketing campaign to undermine the efforts being made by the union.
What should rather happen is that any Amazon employee who wants to join a union and pay their monthly subscription must by law be free to do so. Also by law, once union representation at a given Amazon location reaches a certain density [say 60%] then the union must by law be given the right to represent all their members, at that location, en mass. Similarly, if 60% of a given group of Amazon workers [say warehouse staff] unionize, then the union must be entitled to negotiate on behalf of that group of the work force.
Your argument about "the workers have spoken" is entirely the kind of trap that Amazon want their workforce to fall in to: to believe that because one single attempt at one single location failed, the concept of a union is proven false. All of the Amazon propaganda, sorry, counter-programming discussed during this vote shows a company terrified of a union forming. Why? Because that would give the employees protection against the bullying tactics of a previously all-powerful employer.
And if Amazon believed their own propaganda and believed that they were such an amazing employer, what could they possibly have had to fear?
I appreciate that this is likely not comparable, but a distant relative of our family, living and working in the UK, worked as a pilot for a company that had a combination of fixed-wing and rotary aircraft and was involved in logistics, maintenance, contract services and training. A new manager joined and unilaterally decided to axe the entire fixed-wing division. It turned out that my relative was a member of BALPA - the British AirLine Pilots Association, a UK union for professional pilots.
The fixed-wing unit was about 23-24 people, all told, and through a series of meetings they were walked through the "redundancy" process [the unit was being fully closed and their aircraft sold]. The redundancy package put on the table looked "a bit off", so my relative got in touch with BALPA and asked a few simple questions. In minutes it became clear that the employer was "pulling a fast one", whereupon a union representative offered to come down to the airport and a meeting. The union representative turned out to be a thoroughly decent type, who "accidentally" left some documentation lying around for non-union members, and who spoke to my relative in an open office, in a loud voice. All told, BALPA was able to improve the packages across the board for the fixed-wing team, not by strong-arming the employer, but pointing out only where the employer was making an offer that fell far short of legal minimums even while trying to dress it up as a special deal.
Employers would love us to think that unions are "bad" and "cause trouble", but more often the not they are the last and only line of defence that individual people have when they are being mis-treated by an employer.
For example, do you think that Google would have been quite so cavalier with Timnit Gebru, the AI Ethicist, if she had been a union member? No - because they would have had a *real* fight on their hands.
Don't get me wrong - unions *can* make things worse. For evidence, look at what happened in the UK before and during the Winter of Discontent [wikipedia.org]. But also bear in mind that if "done right", a good trades union can strengthen and industry and help ensure fair play. They speak up for safety, for ethical treatment, for fairness in pay and working conditions. They defend against bias, they provide protections for vulnerable employees.
The important thing is to let the Amazon (and all other) employees do what they want, free of intimidation from their employer.
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union propaganda on the other
comme ci comme ça
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TFA discusses mandatory meetings, posters, text messages - an incessant marketing campaign to undermine the efforts being made by the union.
This is normal marketing and nothing at all to do with the location or size of the union arrangement. If the unions decided to form globally the campaign would just be bigger. Welcome to marketing.
And if Amazon believed their own propaganda and believed that they were such an amazing employer, what could they possibly have had to fear?
Non sequitur. Being the world's best employer doesn't mean you aren't afraid of some of the real negative consequences of unionisation, especially when the union is strong. Amazon stand to gain nothing and lose a lot from unions forming. It's a tip in the balance of power. How good of an employer you are is comple
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You're basically describing the Employee Free Choice Act from the Obama era, though it was 50% there. I'm a union leader, fine, 60 percent, whatever; make this process less ridiculous.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
New Jersey passed the "Workplace Democracy Enhancement Act" which, besides sounding somewhat Orwellian, does similar things.
https://www.njleg.state.nj.us/... [state.nj.us]
As far as "unions can make things worse" goes, unions are run by humans. Humans can ruin any endeavor. You're not wrong, but I feel like d
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Like you, I agree that individual employees must be free to make their own choice regarding union membership. However, what I then go on to say is that when the percentage of a given workforce [and I plucked 60% merely to be an illustrative example] achieves a certain threshold, then the law must allow a union to participate in negotiating with an employer, by virtue of being able to
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As long as they cannot negotiate for a closed shop, only negotiate for the union members, and those not in the union are not adversely affected by the negotiations.
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Why? Why should a union be required to do the work of negotiating something and also making sure that no non-union employees are harmed? What on earth kind of condition is that to place on things? And what does "harmed" mean? Presumably unions would be free to negotiate better working conditions than non-union employees under that situation. Is that "harm?"
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The problem with that is when the union demands that non-union employees get laid off before union members do.
Why is that a problem? If I'm paying union fees I'm going to expect the union to advocate for me.
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In many cases it actually is, and in a lot more cases its actively being advocated for - for example in the post by ytene.
Why should a union be able to interfere in a contract between a non-union member and the company? Why should a union be able to force someone to pay union fees even though they do not want to be part of the union?
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The fact of the matter is that the way the normally works out, at least at my workplace, is that the employer then offers the same deal to the non-union employees, making sure that it doesn't foment unrest in the non-union employees or make them want to join a union. Why should the non-union employees benefit from the union's hard work?
Anyhow, the situation as it stands now, post Janus v. AFSCME, is that unions have to represent employees that choose not to be members, and they no longer have to pay any due
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Why should the non-union employees benefit from the union's hard work?
Thats a standard argument, and quite frankly a bullshit one - the union should concentrate on the people it represents, it shouldn't be spewing bile about people it doesn't represent that gain anyway. If enough people stop contributing, the union will stop representing because its not worth their while (telling, that, isnt it?), and the company might start exploiting, causing the union to be called back in.
Why should THAT be true, exactly?
Because thats the deal the union is taking on by engaging. If it doesn't like it, it can simply stop
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Why should the non-union employees benefit from the union's hard work?
Thats a standard argument, and quite frankly a bullshit one - the union should concentrate on the people it represents, it shouldn't be spewing bile about people it doesn't represent that gain anyway. If enough people stop contributing, the union will stop representing because its not worth their while (telling, that, isnt it?), and the company might start exploiting, causing the union to be called back in.
WTF are you talking about? The union does concentrate on the people it represents. Why should non-union employees automatically be entitled to the same thing? I personally don't care one way or the other, and workers benefitting is workers benefitting, but it's anti-worker nonsense to claim that everyone should get what the union gets without participating.
Why should THAT be true, exactly?
Because thats the deal the union is taking on by engaging. If it doesn't like it, it can simply stop representation and walk away.
At no point should a union be allowed to interfere in the relationship between two other parties - that happens far too much in union situations, the union gets to dictate to non-members and steal their money.
*Citation needed.
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It's unfair that Amazon is permitted to present its case as a condition of employment. You think that's a reasonable balance of power?
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This is how I see it. "How Will Union Organizers Continue Their Fight With Amazon?" They won't, the workers have spoken. Any attempt to continue would be nothing more than a grab for power for the few that are trying to organize one.
I think this bit from TFS is especially telling:
...many labor leaders think Congress should go further, letting workers unionize companywide or industrywide, not just by work site as is typical...
Emphasis mine.
Basically the labor leaders envision a world where you're either part of the union, or you don't work in that industry. Period. In other words, they have a monopoly on not only the labor, but the job market, and it's up to the union management whether you're even allowed to work. Even somebody who thinks labor unions are good for everybody to be a member of should see just how ripe for abuse that is. Labor leaders have a long, long, long history
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Meet the new boss, worse than the old boss.
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if I was Amazon I would simply fire them
There's probably some rules in the NLRA that protects organization. Union organizers might be prohibited from another try within some time period. But they can come back if they claim that conditions have changed. Or the rules have changed.
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Not in Alabama there isn't. It's a "fire your ass at will" state. I worked a few yeas in Alabama. Never again. I will live in a cardboard box in California before I work in Alabama again.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not against unions. I'm kind of disappointed this failed. In Alabama they will need all the help they can get. What I am against is a small group of people trying to set up a union and not taking "no" for an answer for the people they want to represent. If the same group of people want to
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Not in Alabama there isn't. It's a "fire your ass at will" state. I worked a few yeas in Alabama. Never again. I will live in a cardboard box in California before I work in Alabama again.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not against unions. I'm kind of disappointed this failed. In Alabama they will need all the help they can get. What I am against is a small group of people trying to set up a union and not taking "no" for an answer for the people they want to represent. If the same group of people want to push forward with this even after they have been told 'no' then it becomes a power grab to me by a small group saying they are for everyone.
yeah we had a group like that near where i live about 15 years ago that was determine to unionize a local grocery store wither the majority of employees wanted to be or not. It was under near constant strike for several years, despite the fact they had voted against unionizing on multiple occasions. they would try and intimidate customers and make a general nuisance of themselves. If they employees actually want to unionize i respect that right, however if they don't want to then you can just fuck right off
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Or it could be that the employer put a huge amount of resources into fighting the union, changed the conditions toward the end of the process so that 3x the people as before were voting in the election (which neatly tracks with the results), and that you could actually get fired from your shitty job if Amazon detects that you're part of the effort.
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Most Americans have been sold a bill of goods by propagandists employed generally by large corporations that do better financially if they don't have to split any of the profits with the employees. It's not indicative of anything other than a lot of time and money spent claiming unions are something they are not, and a lot of ineffective unions adding credence to those notions.